How do Carrier Pigeons know where to go?

They know because they're going home.

Only they know :wink:

Actually, the pigeon just goes "home" from wherever it was released ... all it will do is seek its home coop, the one in which it was raised. Its not like it gets instructions to go to 123 Any Street, Such-and-Such Town. Exactly how they navigate, however, is a bit of a mystery. There is some conjecture the method involves magnetic fields, the angle of the sun, landmarks, and a buncha other things.

... and the males never seem to ask directions, which annoys the female carrier pigeons quiet a bit ...

There's a carrier pigeon that has been flying around my place for the better part of three years.

I think he's lost.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/02/06/homing.pigeons.reut/



How 'bout that!

What do they carry?

dlowan- Pigeons often "worked" for the military, carrying messages:

http://www.petworld.cc/Pigeonworld_cc/Fanciers_articals/fanciers_articals.html

Better than carrier rats I suppose

Heehee - they tried to teach them to fly bombs....into ships - by pecking o the silhouette of a ship, and feeding them when they kept it centred....kamikaze pigeons.

Don't know as it ever quite worked.

They kept being distracted by passing statues....

Monarch butterflies find the ancestoral breeding grounds with possibly 3 brain cells to rub together. What's so great about pigeons?

Helluvalot more meat on a pigeon than on a butterfly ... lots tastier, too.

Ah, the subtle majesty of the pigeon. The way it swoops and soars, the way it's gentle voice calls to the world weary and the sick to take heart and be merry! Bask in the gentle nature of the wild pigeon, so close and yet so far from the reach of man. Unspoilt and incorruptable, in it's discerning appreciation for the finest of art the wonderous pigeon shall live forever in fond memory as the only creature to poop on politicians and get away with it.

Until some years, the carrier pigeon was offcially called by the Swiss Army (they started to use them in 1878)
"Self-reproducing small missile on biological basis with hard coded automatic return from any direction and distance" ("Selbstreproduzierender Kleinflugkörper auf biologischer Basis mit fest programmierter automatischer Rückkehr aus beliebigen Richtungen und Distanzen")

The (translated) German word for it is "letter pigeon", comonly known as the "race horse of ordinary Joe " (it's a big [betting] sport here).

The reason this question came to mind in the first place is because I saw on the news that they'd released a bunch in Rome the other day that were headed to Athens for the Games...and that got me thinking that you guys would have some good answers about it...

...and I was right!!